Avner started toward the scout’s corner in a slipping, sliding sprint Tavis placed a foot in one of the log’s enormous steps and gave it a shove, at the same time pulling a regular arrow from his quiver. As the youth climbed the ladder, the scout nocked his shaft and started toward the exit.
Clutching the bloody stump at the end of his wrist, Hagamil rose and moved to cut the escapees off. Tavis fired, and the arrow lodged itself deep in the giant’s midriff. Although the impact hardly slowed the frost giant, his face paled to a sickly shade of ivory. He looked down at the dark fletching in horror.
“Another step and I’ll say the words!” Tavis warned.
Hagamil stopped, two of his enormous paces from the exit. Several more warriors extracted themselves from the groaning pile behind the chieftain and came to stand at his side, but he motioned for them to go no farther. The scout drew a real runearrow from his quiver, but did not nock it
“If you let us go, that arrow in your stomach won’t explode,” Tavis said, choosing his words carefully and keeping a sharp eye on Hagamil. “But the instant anyone so much as steps toward the exit, you die.”
The threat caused several giants to raise a thoughtful brow.
“And if I go, so does Halflook,” Hagamil was quick to add. “You don’t want to be without your shaman, do you?”
The giants frowned and stepped back, giving Tavis and Avner a clear path. The two slipped along the wall, taking care to stay well out of Hagamil’s reach, and backed through the exit into the windy night The scout glanced down the slope to make certain Graytusk was where he had left the beast, then nocked his third-to-last runearrow.
Avner whispered, “I hope you noticed that isn’t a runearrow in Hagamil’s gut”
“I can’t afford to waste any,” the scout explained.
From inside the cavern echoed a nervous groan, followed by Hagamil’s angry voice, “It’s out Get them!”
“Now, Olchak!” Tavis yelled, praying the old man and his fellows had gotten into position in time. “They’re coming!”
Olchak and two assistants leaped from their hiding places beside the cavern, tugging on one end of a thick rope. As they pulled, a heavy line rose out of the snow at the cave’s mouth, coming taut at a height of about six feet. The traells quickly knotted their rope around an ice crag, then sprinted toward Graytusk.
Tavis pulled his bowstring back, aiming his runearrow at the ice far above the cavern mouth. He had to hold the tension for only a moment before the first frost giant came running out of the cave. The brute’s ankle caught on the line and snapped it like twine, but that did not save him from tripping and crashing face-first into the snow. The second giant fell over him, and the scout released his shaft as the third warrior appeared in the entrance. The runearrow struck perhaps a hundred feet above their heads, burying itself deep into the icy cliff.
“Basil is wise!” Avner yelled gleefully.
A deafening crack rang out across the caldera, then a mountain of ice crashed down on the fallen giants. They did not even have time to scream before they vanished beneath the roaring avalanche.
“That should keep Hagamil penned until morning,” Tavis said, yelling to make himself heard above the din. He took Avner by the arm and limped toward Graytusk. “Let’s hope there isn’t another exit.”
“Yeah,” said Avner. “Then it’d be a lot easier for them to beat us to Split Mountain.”
“Split Mountain?” Tavis asked. “Why would we go there?”
Avner shrugged. “I don’t know.” A mischievous grin crept across the youth’s lips. “But the traells heard you say you wanted to go to some meeting the frost giants are having. That’s where it’s supposed to be.”
13
The gray snow clouds streamed across the ominous white sky like battle standards, which, to Tavis, they were. The storm had hung back all day long, licking at Graytusk’s wooly heels as he ambled across glacier and valley, his sauntering gait lapping up miles as briskly as the strides of a galloping horse. For a while, the scout had thought the beast would stay ahead of the blizzard. But now, with the sky darkening toward dusk and hoarfrost swirling in the wind, he saw that his forecast had been little more than a forlorn hope. The clouds were pouring over the mountains with a speed that warned of the storm’s power, and already the mammoth’s fur was covered with those tiny snow stars that meant the blizzard would be as cold as it was ferocious.
Tavis ran his gaze around the broad cirque into which they were descending. The basin was shaped like a human jaw, with dozens of jagged spires surrounding a flat, mottled vale of pale meadows and swarthy stands of spruce. To the scout’s dismay, low-hanging clouds with long skirts of swirling snow already capped most of the peaks. Any of those pinnacles could be Split Mountain and he would never see it.
Tavis glanced over his shoulder, where Avner and Olchak rode. Both the boy and old man sat sideways, for their legs were too short to straddle the mammoth’s broad back. They held themselves in place by clutching a makeshift harness that Avner had rigged from a frost giant rope.
“Are you sure this is the valley, Olchak?” the scout asked.
The old man looked around the cirque. By the vacant look in his eye, Tavis could tell the traell did not recognize the place.
“A shortcut doesn’t do much good if we don’t know where it comes out,” the scout grumbled.
“You say ‘take Split Mountain fast!’ ” Olchak replied. “Olchak do that Mountain here somewhere-if not this valley, next one.”
“It’d better be this one,” Tavis muttered. “By the time we reach the floor, we won’t be able to see Graytusk’s trunk, much less Split Mountain.”
“What if we don’t find it?” asked Avner. The youth turned toward Tavis, the hood of his borrowed bearskin parka pulled far forward to shelter his face from the cold. Despite the boy’s precautions, his nose and cheeks had turned pallid white. “I mean, what if we don’t find Split Mountain tonight?”
Tavis fixed an icy glare on the youth, then drew a heavy fur muffler from his satchel. “Tie this over your face, Avner.” He tossed the scarf at the boy. “You’re already frostbitten.”
Without saying another word, the scout turned around to guide Graytusk into the basin. The task was largely unnecessary. The mammoth knew his own limitations and was traversing the slope at a shallow angle, taking care to pick solid footing and keep his immense weight squarely over his legs. The beast’s only fault lay in his habit of brushing against the goblet pines that flecked the hillside, forcing his passengers to keep ducking or risk being swept off their mount by a face full of stiff boughs. Tavis did his best to guide the mammoth away from the trees, but the creature seemed to grow only more stubborn as the storm worsened.
By the time they reached the bottom of the hill, a gauzy veil of snow had fallen over the valley. The thickets of weeping spruce ahead seemed no more than drooping silhouettes. The lush meadows of alpine grass became patches of unblemished white against a streaky background of blue-tinted pearl. Even the craggy peaks were hidden behind an impenetrable curtain of white. Tavis knew he and his companions would be hard-pressed to reach any of the pinnacles, much less the correct one.
Graytusk seemed to know exactly where he was going. The beast ambled onto the basin floor and crashed into the nearest spruce thicket. Tavis pressed himself tightly against the mammoth’s skull to keep from being swept off and hauled back on both ears. Graytusk merely flapped his head, nearly throwing the scout off, and broke into a small meadow. He raised his trunk and gave an ear-piercing trumpet, then stepped across a gurgling stream in a single stride.
“Wait!” Olchak called. “That Dragon Rock! Stop!”
Tavis could not comply. Their mount had taken charge of the journey and was continuing toward the next copse at a determined lope. The scout knew little about mammoth habits and could not say what had triggered Graytusk’s excitement Perhaps the beast smelled something good to eat, or was simply anxious to find a sheltered place before the full force of the blizzard hit. Whatever the reason, he would not stop.